The Library of Congress has more than 1,500 special editions of the Bible in more than 150 languages in its Rare Book collections. The Gutenberg Bible, on display in the library's Great Hall, is the most famous item in this collection as it was the first time a book was printed with individual pieces of metal type instead of carving wood blocks for each page, or writing and illustrating each page by hand. The Gutenberg Bible looks remarkable, but its great importance is due to starting the era of mass producing books.

Many other special bibles can also be found in the Library. One of the rare and remarkable items in our collections is the Giant Bible of Mainz, and another one is the beautifully illustrated and illuminated manuscript, known as the Nekcsei-Lipócz Bible. Created in the Kingdom of Hungary in the early 14th century, the nearly 750 vellum leaves (close to 1,500 pages) were later bound into two volumes. According to one of the illustrations in it (the image to the right), it was commissioned as a gift for a church by Demeter Nekcsei, chief lord treasurer of Hungary, who died in 1338. 

These two volumes are among the most remarkable items in the collections of the Library of Congress. It is a complete Bible with vividly colored and beautiful illustrations, and with illuminations using gold paint to make the pages shimmer. The whole work remains remarkably well preserved 700 years after its creation.

The mystery of its whereabouts for the first 500 years of its existence also makes it interesting. The first document that we have about its existence is from the 19th century, when an English collector bought it. We know how much he paid for it, but not from whom he acquired it. The Library of Congress bought it from this collector's estate at the end of the 19th century. It was clear when the Library received it that it was a richly illustrated copy in two volumes (it was bound in England in the 19th century), but it was not known when it was made or in which workshop. In the early 20th century when art historians were able to compare works by traveling to see different collections, they sent each other black and white photographs, and published articles about their findings, and thus they were able to link it to a place and time. Once it was determined that it was made in Hungary, a Hungarian historian was able to identify the coat of arms in the image which depicts the benefactor and his wife who donated it. According to the drawing they built a church too, and this Bible was most likely made for that church. Unfortunately, we do not know which church the image refers to.

If you wish to learn about the style of the illustrations, the style of the written text, or would like to have descriptions for the illustrated pages, there are two books to turn to, one of which is now available online. If you wish to explore what is known about this book's history, and how was it discovered in the 1940s, where was it made and who commissioned it, there is information about that too in the two books mentioned, and in studies listed below on this page. We included in this guide brief descriptive and historical overviews of the Bible that are taken from two publications either published or co-published by the Library of Congress. They are:

• The Nekcsei-Lipócz Bible. A Fourteenth Century Manuscript from Hungary in the Library of Congress, Ms. Pre-Accession 1. A Study by Meta Harrsen. Washington: Library of Congress, 1949. This is available online.

• A Nekcsei-Biblia legszebb lapjai. (The Most Beautiful Pages of the Nekcsei Bible). Budapest: Helikon / Washington: Library of Congress, 1988. Contains 108 p. of facsims. with Hungarian explanatory text on parallel pages. The accompanying booklet entitled The Nekcsei Bible includes the introduction in English, translation of the publisher's foreword, and of the explanatory text entitled Tanulmányok a Nekcsei-Bibliáról which consists of studies by Dercsényi Dezső, Wehli Tünde, and Levárdy Ferenc.

More information is available about the Nekcsei Lipócz Bible in this blog post. In addition, there is a Hungarian language study External about the remarkable life of Demeter (sometimes referred to as Dömötör) Nekcsei of Lipócz written in 1890, before this Bible was linked to him. (If you do not read Hungarian but have access to the ADT External database, then you have easy access to an English translation of the study, as that database provides an option to have all the texts translated). We scanned the article and provide the PDF version of it below:

Other Library of Congress Guides on Bibles and on Hungarian Resources

In addition to this guide on the Nekcsei Lipócz Bible, we have produced other detailed guides on Hungarian resources, and guides to the Library's Bible collection.